Your Smile & Your Well-being
Smiling, it’s good for you! There are many reasons to smile as it provides many benefits to your health and well-being. However, there are some lifestyle choices that can be extremely harmful to our oral health. In this article, we will look at the positives of smiling on your well-being and the negative lifestyle choices that can impact your smile.
Pros of Smiling
Reason to Smile #1: Smiling makes you feel happier as it moves facial muscles, which sends signals to the brain to release feel-good chemicals such as serotonin and endorphins.
Reason to Smile #2: Smiling can help strengthen your immune system, particularly when you laugh. As you laugh, the diaphragm muscle moves more, helping to push lymphatic fluid around the body, which contains cells to help boost immunity.
Reason to Smile #3: Smiling can help you think more logically as it stimulates the right and left sides of the brain and frontal lobe, which is the area used to make decisions and think logically.
Reason to Smile #4: Smiling can make you look more attractive as it activates the area of the brain that makes you feel rewarded and lifts the mood of everyone around you.
Reason to Smile #5: It helps burn more calories. US research has found that people who smile and laugh when watching comedy clips burned 20% more calories as a result than those who didn’t.
The link between bad teeth and mental health
Bad teeth can often be a cause of social problems, embarrassment, or self-consciousness, resulting in a person limiting their social interactions. Bad teeth can stop a person from smiling, laughing, or talking in order to prevent others from seeing their teeth. As a result, a person who does not smile is not gaining the benefits that smiling brings to their overall well-being. Over time, this could lead to anxiety or depression.
The importance of oral hygiene to your well-being
Taking care of your smile means you are taking care of your overall well-being also. Unable to smile, or suffering in pain or discomfort, which prevents you from smiling, is an important issue that should be addressed with your dentist.
Any bacteria that can cause issues with your teeth are not just isolated to the mouth. They can lead to poor health in other parts of the body. Gum disease, for example, if left untreated, can break down the soft tissue in the mouth. The chronic pain that follows as a result can cause difficulties speaking or swallowing, loss of sleep, and eventually, tooth loss that impacts your overall smile.
People with gum disease are also 2 to 3 times more exposed to the risks of heart attack or stroke. Gum disease can provoke an attack by the immune system which can trigger inflammation which in turn can cause arthritis, diabetes, and respiratory disease.
Needless to say, keeping on top of your oral hygiene doesn’t just keep your mouth healthy, but your body and mind healthy also.
What Can You Do?
- Smile more.
- Look after your smile through good oral hygiene.
- Speak to a prosthodontist if you want to improve your smile.
Smiling will improve your overall well-being. In fact, a study at Wayne State University found that people who smile more may live around seven years longer than people that don’t.
Hold onto your dental hygiene and make sure it is as good as it can be. Brushing and flossing twice daily ensures that bad and unnecessary bacteria are removed. Also, don’t forget to drink plenty of water to help keep the acids in your mouth down.
If you want to improve the look of your smile and your dentist has recommended cosmetic dentistry, speak to one of our specialists before you proceed. For the time and expense involved in complex treatment, it’s worth getting a second opinion.
To make a no-obligation appointment, contact us online or call the surgery on (08) 9321 1632.